Working Groups

Social Movement Working Group

The Social Movement Working Group seeks to ensure that social movements and grassroots have a permanent space within ESCR-Net to organize joint actions and projects and take advantage of the potentials of the network to strengthen their work. 

Corporate Accountability Working Group

The ESCR-Net Corporate Accountability Working Group strives to strengthen corporate accountability for human rights through the collective efforts and advocacy of grassroots groups and NGOs around the world.

Initiatives

Trade, Investment, Finance and Human Rights Initiative

The ESCR-Net International Trade and Investment Discussion Group is organized to facilitate information-sharing and collective efforts related to international trade and investment as intersecting human rights, particularly economic, social, and cultural human rights.

Optional Protocol to the ICESCR Initiative

ESCR-Net has worked in support of the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (OP-ICESCR) by supporting national level efforts to advocate for this mechanism and by developing informational resources. 

Budget Analysis and ESCR Initiative

The Budget Analysis and ESCR Initiative seeks to facilitate discussion and joint actions among groups and individuals interested in Budget Analysis and ESCR, ESCR-Net has formed a Discussion Group, which includes almost 200 groups and individuals working and interested in this field.

Caselaw Database on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Initiative

The ESCR-Net Caselaw Database contains examples of instances in which legal strategies have been used successfully to claim ESCR at both the international and national levels and seeks to encourage discussion of crucial challenges for ESCR advocacy and to inspire joint projects and actions to address those challenges.

Discussion Groups

Discussion Group on Women and ESCR

The Women and ESCR Discussion Group provides an online space for organizations, individual advocates, and academics to share resources and information, to discuss key issues and potential responses, and to explore possibilities for collective efforts.

Discussion Group on Human Rights and the Environment

This Discussion Group was created to exchange information and facilitate debate, joint actions and strategy exchange on two interrelated areas of work: human rights and environment. The group is formed by people that work in one or the other area in order to explore the relations between the two.

Discussion Group on Budget Analysis and ESCR

This Discussion Group seeks to share information on initiatives taking place in different countries of the world, aimed to promote the use of public budget analysis as a tool to identify violations of economic, social and cultural rights.  It also seeks to generate debate regarding the difficulties and obstacles on the use of this tool as well as to be a channel for capacity building and exchange of resources.

Discussion Group on Corporate Accountability

This Discussion Group facilitates discussion, information exchange and joint work among organizations and individuals from all over the world that are working to achieve that corporations incorporate human rights standards in their operations. This group is one of the means of communication of the Working Group on Corporate Accountability.

Discussion Group on the Human Right to Health

This Discussion Group was established to facilitate discussion and information exchange relevant to the Right to Health. Originally the discussion group focused on human rights issues related to HIV/AIDS. Over time, the interest of participants in the discussion group expanded to a broader focus on the human right to health.

Discussion Group on Adjudication of ESCR

This Discussion Group was created to faciliate communication among organizations and individuals interested in demanding ESCR through legal mechanisms. We hope this space will also be a forum for the exchange of strategies and updated information on the development of case law related to ESCR.

Export Credit Agencies and Human Rights

The Export Credit Agencies (ECAs) and Human Rights Initiative seeks to hold ECAs accountable to human right standards in their project funding decisions.  Following on the success of an initial Workshop and Strategy Session bringing together human rights activists and IFI campaigners, a set of follow up activities is being advanced that includes additional research, outreach and advocacy actions.